drawing a breath between each
sentence, trailing closely every word.
— James Hoch, ‘Draft’ in Miscreants
1.
some things, I knew,
were beyond choosing:
didu — grandmother — wilting
under cancer’ s terminal care.
mama — my uncle’ s — mysterious disappearance —
ventilator vibrating, severed
silently, in the hospital’ s unkempt dark.
an old friend’ s biting silence — unexplained —
promised loyalties melting for profit
abandoning long familial presences of trust.
devi’ s jealous heart misreading emails
hacked carefully under cover,
her fingernails ripping
unformed poems, bloodied, scarred —
my diary pages weeping wordlessly —
my children aborted, my poetry breathless forever.
2.
these are acts that enact themselves, regardless —
helpless, as I am,
torn asunder permanently, drugged, numbed.
strange love, this is —
a salving: what medics and nurses do.
i live buddha-like, unblinking, a painted vacant smile —
one that stores pain and painlessness —
someone else’ s nirvana thrust upon me.
some things I once believed in
are beyond my choosing —
choosing is a choice unavailable to me.